Jesse Berger, artistic director of New York City's Red Bull Theater, a troupe not afraid of bloody tragedies, makes his Denver Center Theatre Company directing debut with a new production of Shakespeare's Richard III.

Andrew Long

Performances play Jan. 30–Feb. 28. Opening is Feb. 5 at DCTC's The Stage Theatre. Berger sets the play "in the bombed-out shell of a cathedral, a site of rituals," according to DCTC notes. "This setting symbolizes his belief that this culmination of Shakespeare's history plays is an exorcism — a purging of the war and evil that had overtaken England. The play follows the rise, reign and fall of King Richard III, a consummate villain — charming, daring, witty, and appealing — encased in a hideous form."

Andrew Long, a veteran of The Shakespeare Theatre and Signature Theatre, makes his Denver Center debut as the so-called "lump of foul deformity," Richard.